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Saturday, March 29, 2014

We are looking for volunteers to help excavate at Wiawaka Holiday House
at the southern end of Lake George, New York. We will be documenting the
early years of the Holiday House by looking at the materials the
visitors, staff, and organizers left behind. Wiawaka Holiday
House was founded in 1903 to provide affordable vacations for the
working women in the factories of Troy and Cohoes, New York. My
dissertation research looks at the intersections of class and gender in
the early twentieth century.

No previous archaeological experience is necessary; you will learn
archaeological techniques hands-on at the site. All equipment will be
provided.

If you have no previous archaeological experience, please agree to volunteer for 3 or more days; 18 years of age or older only.

Accommodation and meals are available at Wiawaka Holiday House for a fee.* There is no charge to volunteer.

What can you expect? This summer, we will be excavating in three
areas of the site to document the experiences of visitors, summer staff,
and of the year-round caretakers.

Excavation involves the
following physical activities: shoveling, crouching or kneeling on the ground, lifting
buckets of dirt to pour into a screen, shaking the screen to
separate artifacts from the soil, and filling the hole back in once all
the information has been recovered. We will spend 8 hours a day Monday
through Friday excavating, taking one hour for lunch
in the middle of the day. Instruction will include archaeological
methods, note taking, and basic artifact identification and
interpretation. Rain day volunteers are more than welcome to help
process artifacts in the lab. Participants can either purchase lunch
at Wiawaka* or pack a lunch to eat on-site. There is no smoking
permitted anywhere on Wiawaka property.

Excavation Dates: Monday to Friday, June 16 through July 11, 2014

Megan Springate, excavation director, is a PhD candidate at the University of Maryland.

For information and to sign up for this unique opportunity, contact Megan Springate at
mes@umd.edu

* Volunteers are welcome to stay overnight at Wiawaka for $75 per night
prior to June 19. Meals are available only after June 23rd. After June
23rd, the room rate per person is $110 weekdays and $125 weekends,
including meals.
Volunteers who wish to purchase meals onsite
after June 23rd may do so: $8 for breakfast, $12 for lunch, $16 for
dinner.

This website is a way to share information about the ongoing Wiawaka archaeology project, including information about the process, research findings, artifacts, musings, photographs, and announcements. Follow us on twitter for updates!

Comments and questions are more than welcome. Feel free to post them in the comments section or email me at meganspringate AT gmail DOT com.